Re: [Xouvert-general] Recent Popular questions turned into FAQ

[William Lahti]

On Tuesday 19 August 2003 2:16 am, David Ross wrote:
> Perhaps we need a FAQ?  I would be happy to maintain it.  If my
> questions/answers/definitions are incomplete/wrong/etc feel free to
> change.
>
> We could start off with:
> 1.)   Q)      Will Xouvert remove/modularize network transparency?  I
> think we should do this to make X faster, more robust, or just plain
> better.
>       A) We *cannot* remove network transparency. Period. There is
> absolutely no
> question about it whatsoever. X11 *is* a _network_ protocol. I think the
> reason everyone thinks its slow, is because everyone thinks that X11 on
> a local machine goes thru TCP/IP. It doesn't. It uses UNIX sockets
> which are very fast.
>
> 2.)   Q)      Why does Xouvert use the XFree License?  I think the
> GPL/BSD/<my favourite license> is way better.
>       A)      We are using the XFree License so that we maintain
> license compatibility with Xfree86(tm) and so that we can contribute our
> developments/code/improvements back to the XFree86 project.  We do not
> want to fork the Xouvert and XFree86 projects.
>
> 3.)   Q)      I keep hearing this talk of forking and branching,
> what's the diff?
>       A)      If we were to fork Xouvert from XFree86, then we would
> be creating a whole other X Window system. 

Clarify that as "a seperate X11 server". People may think we mean 
incompatibility between programs for Xouvert and programs for XFree86.

> We don't want to do that.
> That would be bad because XFree86 is a proven accepted standard on many
> platforms.  It is it already stable, but lacks some features that
> I/we/you/he/she/someone wants.  

The part about XFree86 being a proven accepted standard: XFree86 is not the 
standard, X11 is. X11 = network protocol XFree86 = X11 implementation.

> That is why we are branching it--to pick
> up the pace, and have a more public development process those developers
> who want to work on X and for those who need to be on the bleeding edge.

And to do more experimental stuff (incorporate that somehow).

> A branch simply means that we want to have our work integrated back into
> the larger whole and that we want to maintain compatibility with
> XFree86.

No, it means that our code is intended to be recontributed back. Compatibility 
is not a problem, X11 is a standard...

>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: address@hidden
> [mailto:address@hidden On Behalf
> Of Jonathan Walther
> Sent: 2003 August 18 9:59 PM
> To: address@hidden
> Subject: Re: [Xouvert-general] License question
>
> On Tue, Aug 19, 2003 at 06:35:58AM +0200, Massimo Santoro wrote:
> >The question was: "why not make it GPL instead of X11/MIT?"
> >
> >The answer was: "because we could not recontribute to XFree86"
> >
> >Then: "GPL would not cause anything <bad> about this, let's not forget
> >it is
> >an independent fork, maybe GPL would make it better".
>
> That is false.  Xouvert is an independant developement branch.  It is
> not a fork.  Everything we do, is intended to be incorporated in the
> "stable" XFree86 project eventually.
>
> As a branch, and not a fork, it is important to keep the licenses
> compatible and consistent, and not to alienate our co-developers at the
> XFree86 project.
>
> Jonathan

-- 
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Fury // a.k.a William Lahti
Developer, Xouvert
Developer, Slicker Project
Developer, Calyptos
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